| Chapter 2: | Background Study |
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Schwab (NRC, 2000) made three suggestions regarding specific science instructional methods. First, he said that science teachers could use laboratory manuals or textbook materials to pose questions, describe methods to investigate the questions, and then allow students to work through the procedure to learn about specific natural relationships that they did not originally know. Secondly, the materials could be consulted to pose questions to investigate but the method of investigation would be left up to the students. Lastly, a more open approach was recommended where students ask the questions to be investigated, design methods of investigation, gather the evidence, and then propose scientific explanations based on their exploration into the phenomena.
Even though curricula began to reflect what scientists did, there was little impact on the core of U.S. education (Elmore, 1993, 1996). Lack of adequate professional development combined with the absence of national standards are the purported reasons as to why this reform movement was not successful in creating real change in science classrooms in the United States.
Supovitz, Mayer, and Kahle, in Educational Policy (2000), traced the reform movements of the 1920s, 1950s, and 1960s citing inadequate professional development as the reason why most classroom instruction did not change. This finding was echoed by the Shymansky et al. (1990) study of the implementation of inquiry-based curricula. Even though the majority of science teachers still taught in a didactic manner, curriculum kits and resources began to foster an approach to create experiences for students that lead to a broader understanding rather than disconnected facts. Critical reasoning and problem-solving skills were the main emphases of new curricula such as the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS), Science Curriculum Improvement Study (SCIS), Elementary Science Study (ESS), Intermediate Science Curriculum Study (ISCS), and Physical